James, Duke of York, 1660-1685
Anne, Duchess of York, 1660-1671
Mary, Duchess of York, 1676-1688
James, Prince of Wales, 1688
Lady Mary (later Princess of Orange) 1669-1677
James, Duke of Cambridge, 1663-1667
Lady Isabella, 1677-1680
Don't they all sound so charming? If you'll notice, the Duke of Cambridge only lived to be four years old, poor thing.
Anyway, today I am going to focus on someone from James, Duke of York's house. I would like to introduce everyone to Sir Allen Apsley!
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| I apologize, but this is the only photo I could find of him! |
Sir Allen Apsley was born on August 28, 1616, first son of his father who, not surprisingly, was also named Sir Allen Apsley. When naming offspring, people from this period didn't strain their imaginations too much. His father was victualler of the navy and lieutenant of the Tower of London. Apsley went to school at Merchant Taylors' School, London between 1625 and 1628. He went on to Trinity College, Oxford in November 1631. Once the civil war started, Apsley was commissioned into the royalist forces and by 1642, he was commanding a troop of horse under Sir John Byron. The next year, he was serving as Sir John Berkeley's deputy as lieutenant-governor of Exeter. In 1645 he was appointed governor of Barnstaple.
In Devon, Apsley came into contact with the court of Queen Henrietta Maria and Prince Charles who stayed in Barnstaple in June 1645. He also came into contact with Sir Edward Hyde, chancellor of the exchequer and a member of the prince's council who was distantly connected to Apsley through relatives. It is thought that Apsley married a Devon woman named Frances during this period. Following the departure from the west of the prince, Apsley eventually had to surrender Barnstaple the day after Berkeley yielded Exeter as the royalist resistance collapsed in April 1646. Apsley had a close relationship to Colonel John Hutchinson, governor of Nottingham, who had married his sister Lucy and with whom had stayed for a while. As a result of this relationship, Apsley helped to shield him from over-severe composition terms and defended him from a lawsuit. It is thought that his connection to such a figure is what provided him with links to army leadership and a role in the negotiations between the army and the king. Apsley was knighted on October 17, 1646, suggesting a visit to the king at Newcastle. When Sir John Berkeley was dispatched by the queen to England in the summer of 1647 to open negotiations with the army, Apsley bore a warning message to him from Hutchinson's cousin Henry Ireton and Oliver Cromwell. I know that delivering a message doesn't sound THAT impressive, but this was actually a seemingly important job! I mean, can you imagine delivering a message from Oliver Cromwell himself?
Evidence that Apsley became involved in royalist conspiracy eventually surfaced. From about 1657 he was in contact with a relative, Allen Brodrick, the secretary to the Sealed Knot, a secret Royalist association. He also maintained a regular correspondence with Sir Edward Hyde, now the principal coordinator of royalist schemes. However, he was apparently a great conspirator, since he avoided ever falling under suspicion. By early 1660, Apsley was working in London to protect the king's and Hyde's interests.
Apsley became a member of the household of James, Duke of York shortly before the Restoration, presumably through his friendship with Berkeley who was now Lord Berkeley of Stratton, the duke's favorite. He was also given the post master of the privy hawks during a visit to Charles II at The Hague. So now, Apsley was officially a part of both camps, causing a possible strain on his relationships with Royalists, such as Hyde, and those in the court, such as Berkeley and the duke. However, an affair between the duke and Hyde's daughter Anne and their marriage in September 1660 left Apsley well placed as a link in an important political alliance. Elected MP for Thetford, he acted as manager of the duke's concerns in the commons and worked closely with the manager of Hyde's, his old ally Allen Brodrick.
Apsley was appointed cofferer of the duke's household as well, which meant he shared responsibility for the duke's financial affairs with his treasurer and receiver-general, Thomas Povey. However, his relationship with Povey was not a great one, and by 1666 York's finances were a mess. To solve the issue, Apsley took responsibility as treasurer and receiver-general as well. Using his position and prominence, he returned favors paid to him by his brother-in-law, Hutchinson. He helped him to avoid execution and tried to alleviate the conditions of his imprisonment until Hutchinson's death in 1664. Apsley once again became a soldier during the Second Anglo-Dutch War and accompanied the duke on the Royal Charles at the battle of Lowestoft in June 1665. He was appointed colonel to raise a foot regiment in 1667.
Though everything seemed to be going pretty great for Apsley, this wasn't to last. Apsley's salary from being master of the hawks was cut by the Treasury commission in August of 1667. As a consequence, he surrendered the post to the earl of Rochester and William Chiffinch in return for an annuity in 1675. After Hyde was dismissed, Apsley's involvement in managing government business in the Commons was most likely cut. Though he continued to act as the duke's spokesman in the Commons, defending his second marriage to the princess of Modena, he failed to be elected to the Exclusion parliaments.
Apsley apparently underwent a religious conversion later in his life. A set of verse meditations on Genesis, Order and Disorder, published in 1679 was attributed to Apsley by a man named Anthony Wood. His letters to Hyde in the 1650s show a strong interest in modern and classical literature. Yet, in the preface to Order and Disorder the author confesses that he had "experienc'd it to be a very unsafe and unprofitable thing for those that are young, before their faith be fixed, to exercise themselves in the study of vain, foolish, atheistical poesie". Basically, if Apsley wrote this, it seems his conversion was strong enough to steer him away from the interest he once had in classical literature.
Apsley died in his home in St. James's Square, Westminster, on October 15, 1683 and was buried at Westminster Abbey.
Okay...so. I don't know about any of you, but I found Apsley's biography to be a tad dull compared to others I have worked on. I apologize for any drool that may have made it's way onto your laptop if you fell asleep during this biography. It's truly understandable. However! Though Apsley's life story wasn't exactly riveting, I think it is important to read about a life such as his. I love reading stories about monarchs. I could spend all day reading about Charles II or Catherine of Braganza or even Lady Castlemaine. These were prominent people in the court system! Yet, one must realize that their lives were not the lives of everyday men and women. The reason they tend to captivate audiences is because these individuals had the money and power to control the country and its politics. If one had the choice to read about a peasant or a king, I bet that most people would pick the king.
Apsley's life was certainly not average. He was still prominent enough to be knighted and was a part of the royalist conspiracy, yet it doesn't seem that he caused any significant changes. I mean, I could barely find the one photo of him! Apsley was heavily entrenched in politics but his life didn't circle around mistresses, duels, or overthrowing monarchs. He was a soldier, a knight, and a politician and his less "glamorous" story was surely more common than most of the other individuals I have written about. I think it is important for historians to focus on men like him, and even men who were below his rank, for the monarchs only made up a handful of people during this time. Although they had a lot of power, their stories are no more important than those of the soldier, the politician, or even the peasant.
Paul Seaward, ‘Apsley, Sir Allen (1616–1683)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/600, accessed 23 Oct 2016]
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